184 NOVITATES ZOOLOQICAZ XXII. 1915. 



3. Hierqfalco holboclli : S. Greenland. 



4. Ilierofaloo rusticolus ; Arctic America. 

 6. Hierofalco obsoletus : Labrador. 



6. Hierofalco gyrfalco : N. Europe. 

 There are some obvious errors in tbis classification. 



1. With regard to No. 1 I agree, except that I should not have unhesitatingly 

 placed as a synonym Falco uralensis of Menzbier ; but I shall later on come back 

 to this question. 



2. About islandus I agree. 



3. There can, in my opinion, be no doubt, and 1 believe every ornithologist who 

 has studied these Falcons agrees with me, that hfharpo's holhoelU is based on dark 

 specimens of the Greenland Falcon, because there are obvious intergradations 

 between the two. Moreover, this variety is not restricted to South Greenland, but 

 found as far north as Falcons have been found. 



4. Why rusticolus should be restricted to North America is incomprehensible, 

 as it was based on Swedish birds ! 



5 and 6. I agree with Sharpe's distribution and names. 



Quite recently some Falcons have been discussed by Mr. Ogilvie-Grant in the 

 B. 0. U. List of British Birds, which appeared in February 1915. The author 

 admits two species : Falco (called Hierofalco) gyrfalco and islandus. The former 

 he makes to inhabit North Europe, Greenland, and Arctic America to Alaska, and 

 he mentions the Labrador Falcon as a snbspecies of (jijrfalco. The Iceland Falcon 

 he splits into //. islandus and //. islandus caiidicans. He says that //. islandus 

 (which he should have called H. islandus islandus) inhabits Iceland, Jan Mayen, 

 South Greenland, and Northern Siberia, and he considers Sharpe's holboelli to 

 be a synonym, as being based on dark Greenland birds, which are like Icelanders, 

 //. uralensis being another synonym, based on Siberian specimens of islandus. 



The question of the Iceland and Greenland Falcons has always been a ve.xed 

 one. The fact is that many of the Greenland birds are indistinguishable from the 

 Iceland ones, while— as far as I can make out — on Iceland the darker race alone 

 nests, never the lightest one. It is, however, not true that the darker birds alone 

 breed in Southern Greenland, where white ones nest also, nor that the dark form is 

 restricted to the southern parts of Greenland, because it ranges as far north as any 

 Falcons have been shot, and that during the breeding season. There is therefore no 

 question of there being two subspecies, but the light and dark birds from Green- 

 land can only be either two species or one and the same. In the Tring Museum 

 and elsewhere are so many variations and intermediate varieties, that I cannot 

 jiossibly admit their specific distinctness. On the other hand, as white birds 

 do not nest on Iceland, I have tentatively kept seiiarate, as a subspecies, the 

 Iceland birds. 



Another difficult question is the status of the so-called uralensis. It is not 

 yet possible to pass final judgment on the Siberian birds. " Hierofalco uralensis " 

 was first described by Sewertzoif and Menzbier, in Russian, from the Ural. There 

 is a French extract of the description in Joarn.f. Orn. 1883, p. 413. In 1885 

 Seweitzotf described another Falcon from Bering Island as Hierofalco Grebnitzkii. 

 Menzbier united uralensis and grebnitzkii, and supposed this Siberian Falcon to 

 range as far north as the Altai. I should certainly have hesitated to unite (jrebnilzldi 

 with uralensis, but it is significant that it was done by Menzbier, who had both 

 types in hand, and there is in the original description oi grebnitzkii a statement that 



